


Say, say, my playmate

by fairywearsbootz



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Canon Temporary Character Death, Do I even have to warn for that if it's SPN?, Gen, Sibling Love, a softer meme-ficathon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-07
Updated: 2013-11-07
Packaged: 2017-12-31 18:44:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 897
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1035119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fairywearsbootz/pseuds/fairywearsbootz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for a prompt at <a class="i-ljuser-username" href="http://roslindi.livejournal.com/">roslindi</a>'s <a href="http://roslindi.livejournal.com/7412.html">a softer meme-ficathon</a>. The prompt was: <i>Supernatural, Sam/+Dean, "I want people to tell their children terrifying stories about the things we did for love"</i>. Might seem a bit wincest-y at first, but really isn't intended that way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Say, say, my playmate

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted to [LJ](http://fairywearsbootz.livejournal.com/8500.html) on 05-14-2012.

This is love, sometimes: Your brother, next to you in a car, sleeping. You don't look at him, you don't touch him, but as the miles vanish under tireless wheels, you turn the music just a little bit lower.

#

Sam dies, and Dean brings him back.

Dean dies, and Sam can't bring him back.

There’s a lot of other stuff happening, but when push comes to shove, this is where it all starts to go downhill.

You don’t just leave your brother alone, unless you _want_ retaliation.

#

Dean has hit a lot a of people, but it never feels as good when his knuckles split as when the blood smears across his brother's cheek. Hands around throats, and yes, it doesn't matter whose hands or whose throat as long as they're both here, now, together, and he's never felt as much for another person as he hates Sam right now.

“If you walk through that door,” he spits out, through blood and adrenaline and the ache in his throat, and Sam just smiles.

The truth is, he could've been the one to jump-start the Apocalypse just as well, if it had meant he could've hurt his brother just a little bit more.

#

This is love, sometimes: Your fists ready at your side, your lungs burning with words you can never take back. Your brother stands opposite you with narrowed eyes, his mouth distorted with all the right wrong things to say and in that moment you know you will never forget, and in that moment you know you will always forgive, and there's never been a moment you’ve been more alive.

Rage in your blood and your heart and your trembling hands and everything between you is tinted red and burnt white and so wonderful it makes your chest hurt with so much more than simple _anger_.

#

There's a scar on Dean's left hip from when he was ten, and Sam tied his laces together to trip him.

His arm's been broken in three different places from when he was fourteen, and Sam pushed him off his bike.

On his thigh there are crescent-shaped marks from when he was six, and Sam bit him.

There are other scars on his body, of course, from other people, but they're not important.

The only occasions worth remembering are the ones when the blood you taste is just a little bit too familiar.

#

There's Gordon, and the siren, and those two dickheads who thought shooting the harbinger of the Apocalypse would be a good idea.

“We just snuffed his brother, you idiot,” Walt says, “You wanna spend the rest of your life knowing Dean Winchester’s on your ass?”

“I’m gonna warn you; when I come back, I’m gonna be pissed,” Dean says before everything turns black, and he _means_ it.

It's not really about the fact that no one’s allowed to hurt Sammy; it's just that Dean's the only one who gets to, and the only one who gets to decide if his brother lives or dies.

#

This is also love, a lot of times: You fall asleep next to your brother, and you walk next to him, and you know every move he'll make before he makes it. You fight next to your brother, and you fight against him, and you know every weakness of his, every scar and healed tendon and ticklish spot. You drive down a highway far away from your brother, you sleep in single rooms, and still he's next to you with every breath either of you takes.

Even a world full of six billion people doesn't really count against the slowing rise and fall of his chest next to yours after a long, hard fight.

#

Because afterwards — when you've done all the worst you could imagine, after you've said all the words you know you never should've said, after you've cut and slashed and torn everything that ever held you together with vicious glee — that's when you get to stand next to each other, your hands clasped on your brother's arms and his on yours, and you forgive each other everything, _everything_ , without a second thought.

And it doesn't really matter that two dead bodies are lying on the floor next to you, or that a portal of blood is slowly opening; the only thing that matters is the knowledge that no one else has ever hurt you in such a wholesome, achingly good way as you hurt each other.

You hold each other's pulse under your palm and each other's fear in your heart, and you're ready for the next round.

#

People tend to blame Ruby, fortunately they do, and yeah, sure, she was _there_.

Dean watches children play, brothers pulling their sisters' hair, sisters pushing their brothers into bushes and mud and worse, brothers sinking their teeth into their brothers' flesh, and he knows it was never about some woman or demon or anyone else at all.

It's the oldest game in the book of sibling rivalry, eye for an eye, blood for blood, a rock for a stone and a planet for a punch, where the worst weapon is to leave the other, and the second worst is to stay.

All siblings would throw whole worlds to the wolves, if it meant they could continue playing just a little bit longer. Sam and he, they were just handed more dangerous toys.


End file.
